PRIEST OR PRESBYTER.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XXIV, Issue 3509, 14 October 1868, Page 4

PRIEST OR PRESBYTER.

" New presbyter is but old priest writ large."— Milton. To the Editor of the I ailt Southern Cross. Sir, — Theological discusviou is v' aally considered to be unsuitable to the columns or a newspaper, and Ido uob propose to violate the itile. There is, however, a certa'ti rnal/er of fact which is of very gene al in'erei 4 ami with refe:ence to wli'cb. a misiuterpret&tion is likely to be put upon a passage contained in that idiseour c 0* Bishop Suter which you publi.«hc \ in exbenso on Monday, and for the pub'icafcum of whi h, let me add, thy community is much obliged to you. Peru it me veiy briefly to state the f let alluded to. The light rev. preacher saj : "It is certainly unfortunate that we have so thoroughly associate I the sacrificnl iJe - with the word ' priest.' It is not a New Testament word for ministers of the gosp*l." I am confident that the Bishop of Nelson, in m*k'ng the s'ateuient that I have italicized, w."i neither himself misinfo. aa ', nor disposed to al 3t mi apprehension in others ; but this reault is practically produced. The Ap ;hcau Prayerbook employs the word " priest" to clunnte a Christian clergyman : what is the usage ot the New Testament? The word "priest"' is simply aconti action of " pr<=sbj'er," which is tlio (ireek "elder;" and the word "prebbyt-c" is kibituiily eall)lo^rd, by the writers of the New I estamenfc, r an appellation of minis' x : of the Go".ppl. But the twoslatois of the Hible into English " uuf 01 innately '* adopted this woid "pi lest" to repr cent the Hebrew or Greek word deuoling " *carificer ;" and this application of the word "pi I' fc 1 ' in that noble and venerable re *ltory of the Eng i: sh lannr.ttge, has now affixed to t) c term a signification foreign to its origin. So that-, iv short, while t'ifl Prayerbook uses the word '" priest" in its origin «1 signification of ecclesiastical elder, t!ie niithoriaed ver3ion, on the other hand, his j,lvea currency to the ext.'«neous signifi'-itiun of saci 'seer ; and tHs atnbioruity has fottered, in the ir ; .uos of many, a confusion between the two offices. It is cl<-ar, howevei", that the Prayerbook phraseology, iv this matter, is primitive and Scriptural, aud that the e-ror and confusion have arisen from a different source. What remedy ought now to be applied is a qresfon tHt need not be here discussed. — I am, &o. ( Requirens.